The invention relates generally to floating grain elevators, and more particularly to floating transfer vessels for loose granular materials that are movable from place to place for the transfer from barges to ships and the temporary storage of loose granular materials.
In the prior art floating grain elevators provided mooring spaces to a ship on one side and to barges on the other, and to automated digging and conveying apparatus mounted on and in itself. Relative movement between the barges and the transfer vessel, as by waves from passing ships, often caused damage to the automated apparatus unless large working tolerances were used, thereby leaving large amounts of grain in the barges and necessitating independent clean-up equipment being furnished.